Cannon Fire Arc

Chapter 828: Chapter 45: The End of the Winter Offensive

November 20th, the blizzard finally arrived.

Wang Zhong entered the Headquarters, the first thing he did was to shake off the snow on his body at the door, Vasily also came forward with a brush to help him clean it up.

Wang Zhong: “Damn, the weather forecast said it would get colder ten days ago, and now the blizzard comes.”

“Winter has also entered its capricious age,” Vasily joked.

Wang Zhong: “Weather forecast, when will this blizzard stop?”

In such heavy snow, it’s impossible to carry out large-scale military operations, but the strategic goal of flattening the front line during the winter offensive has not been fully achieved.

Vasily replied, “It may not stop for the next week, the Headquarters is currently dealing with supply difficulties caused by the heavy snow. We have stockpiled a certain amount of provisions at the front line, but it’s uncertain if it’s enough; we are now making phone calls to confirm.

“Additionally…”

Wang Zhong: “Additionally?”

“Additionally, there is now a heating fuel shortage in Ronied; the local Church is asking us if we can provide some oil or other things for the common folk to burn.”

Wang Zhong: “Isn’t wood enough?”

“Only enough for three days, locals are organizing emergency logging. But most of the strong men have enlisted.”

Wang Zhong was in the process of taking off his coat but stopped for two seconds and then responded: “Let the anti-aircraft artillery troops and Air Force ground crews help with logging, they’ve got nothing else to do in this heavy snow anyway.”

“Yes.” Vasily responded while taking Wang Zhong’s coat and scarf, “I’ll dry these out before returning them.”

“No, given the current shortage of fuel, let’s not dry them.”

After saying that, Wang Zhong briskly walked into the map room.

He immediately saw Pavlov reading a newspaper and teased: “Even the busy Chief of Staff has time to read the newspapers?”

“This is a Prosenese newspaper.” Pavlov handed the newspaper to Wang Zhong.

It was then that Wang Zhong noticed the densely packed pen translations on the newspaper’s page, while the printed text was all in Prosenese.

Then he noticed the headline on the front page of the newspaper: Rocossov’s Great Failure.

“Did I fail?” he asked in surprise.

Pavlov: “No, it’s about the northern affairs, the failure of the Saint Andrew Regional Army’s breakthrough. But since the Prosens know you are the frontline commander, they attribute all the setbacks we’ve encountered on the entire front line as your failures.”

Wang Zhong silently raised his thumb.

At that moment, a flash lit up the entire map room; Journalist Mike stepped in with the flash, followed by a photographer with a triumphant expression.

Journalist Mike: “I saw the captured Prosenese newspapers and immediately rushed over, I arrived in Ronied yesterday. Lucky I ran fast, if I had flown today, I probably wouldn’t have been able to take off.”

Wang Zhong: “Caught another exclusive interview with me.”

Journalist Mike laughed heartily: “Yes, so what do you think about the Prosens’ latest announcement of victory?”

Wang Zhong: “They indeed achieved a local victory by capitalizing on the complacency for quick success spreading through our troops, plus the Prosen Armored Troops did well.”

Journalist Mike frowned: “Did well?”

Wang Zhong nodded.

In fact, he hadn’t read the reports, but he could generally guess this armored counterattack was orchestrated by which different space-time isomer, after all, on Earth, he was a big fan of this ‘Tiger King’, and the copy of ‘Tiger in Mud’ signed by the ‘Tiger King’ himself in his home is quite rare.

Having encountered the legendary Tiger King in person, Ante’s Armored Troops at least wiped out Koscher, a war comrade of the Tiger King, and already performed better than the Russians on Earth.

Journalist Mike looking at Wang Zhong: “Is it really okay to praise the enemy like this?”

“The enemy also built a very impressive Cemetery for my dear friend Crown Prince Ivan and my father, the Old Duke Rocosov; acknowledging their courage and skill is actually elevating ourselves—since we are the ultimate victors.”

Like the anti-Japanese god dramas on Earth, where the enemy is depicted as idiotic, making one wonder: You were bullied by such idiots for fourteen years?

In the West, they always portray the Nazis and the enemy impressively, like in ‘Five Minutes of Fate’, as if the enemy was close to winning, but actually, their own war history research center determined through interviews with relevant parties that the Nanyun mobile unit needed at least 30 more minutes to reload, and another 30 minutes after that to prepare for action.

But America does not trust this research, always following the enemy’s right-wing narrative nearly winning, the ‘Five Minutes of Fate’, to highlight the ‘Heavenly Soldiers’ thrilling victory.

Later when China became an adversary, America needed to highlight its dominance over Asians, hence in the book ‘Broken Sword’, they finally acknowledged the fifty-year-old research from the enemy themselves.

Anyway, Wang Zhong’s words were an eye-opener for Journalist Mike: “You are right! Belittling the enemy only diminishes the value of our victory, while praising them increases the value of victory!”

Wang Zhong thought to himself, did I just teach America how to propagate?

But then he thought, as an old imperialist country, wouldn’t they know this already?

Journalist Mike’s partner moved around Wang Zhong, continuously clicking the shutter—the indoor lighting was quite good, likely no need for flash to capture fine photos.

Journalist Mike: “So, how effective is the winter offensive?”

“Very good, we have now flattened most of the front line, take a look at the map, previously the front line was like it had been gnawed by rats, now it is much smoother.

“This allows us to save a significant amount of troops, and these relieved troops will spend the next six months resting and training.”